


Tango (It Takes Two)

by plumadesatada



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Dubious Consentacles, Enemies to Lovers, FrostIron - Freeform, Frostiron Month, Light-Hearted, M/M, Tony has a crush, loki is a little shit
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-01
Updated: 2014-07-29
Packaged: 2018-02-07 01:10:04
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 17,922
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1879329
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/plumadesatada/pseuds/plumadesatada
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Loki and Tony don't fall in love so much as saunter vaguely downwards.</p><p> <sub>Fill for the <a href="http://frostiron-month.tumblr.com/faq">frostiron month</a> on tumblr. 10 prompts, 10 chapters. </sub></p>
            </blockquote>





	1. who needs concealer when you've got sarcasm

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> For a god and a mortal these two do share a lot of the same traits. Coincidence? Maybe, but when they’re put together there sure are a lot of fireworks. And snark. Lots of snark.

From behind him, came a voice: “So, hey, when was the last time you got laid?”

The question startled Loki so badly he forgot to keep tapping his foot and almost lost concentration on the spell controlling the beasts below. He managed to regain the heartbeat-like rhythm at the last second, right before two of them managed to get into a fight, but splitting his awareness left him a bit flustered. 

He did not need to look up to know who it was that had invaded his hiding spot. “How did you find me, swine?” he snarled, keeping his senses on the ten zombie animals he was puppeteering, keeping up the steady tap _tap-_ tap _tap_ of his shoe on the linoleum.

The golden faceplate lifted out of the way, exposing Stark and his raised eyebrows. “Ah-ah, I asked first.” He waved a chiding finger in Loki’s direction as he approached further. “So?”

Loki spared a second of thought to shoot a glare at the armored mortal. “I hardly see how that’s relevant,” he muttered almost absently. Stark’s presence behind him was like a furnace he couldn’t see; Loki’s back burned every time he heard the servos whirr, but he couldn’t look.

The metallic clunk of Stark’s boots sounded very near him as it stopped. “Ah,” the man’s voice came, too close for comfort, “I think it’s _very_ relevant. See, I’ve noticed some similarities between us and…”

Feeling one of the beasts prowling around a school bus with hungry intent, Loki stopped paying attention. The mortal carried on with his inane drivel without need of input from Loki, as always; he couldn’t let some words, no matter how annoying the voice saying them, distract him from his goal.

While eight of the reanimated museum pieces — a woolly mammoth, a sabertooth tiger, and a triceratops among them — called everyone’s attention to themselves, the last two, a small pteranodon and nimble mammal of some description, were busy robbing a museum vault. Inside that vault lay a manuscript, rumored to have been written by Merlin himself, full of wondrous spells to summon and control dragons.

The perfect bargaining chip for ‘asking a favor’ of the queen of Nornheim.

“…so, what do you say?”

The primordial mouse was almost done taking the scroll to the pteranodon, who would later take it to a safe drop spot where Loki—

Sudden silence. Stark had stopped talking. The only noise left in the room was the steady tapping of Loki’s foot.

“Huh?” Loki asked, sweat beading on his temples. He glanced at the mortal. “Didn’t hear you. Could you repeat that?”

Stark scoffed. “You just wanna hear me say it again, don’t you?” He seemed… angry? No, not angry. Exasperated.

Loki blinked. “Yes, that _is_ rather the point of asking you repeat yourself.” The pteranodon was in the air. With a sigh of relief, he let go of nine of the ten spells, and he could finally spare some brainpower to deal with the mortal. “Or are you so dense you need me to say it in simpler terms?” He turned around, facing him.

Stark was looking at him with narrowed eyes, his body slightly angled away from Loki. He said nothing.

Hands held up in an open gesture, Loki explained. “You are beneath my notice, so I paid you no mind.”  He displayed his shiny white teeth in a wide grin.

If Loki didn’t know better, he’d say that what flashed in Stark’s expression was hurt, but it went away so quickly he wouldn’t be able to say one way or the other. 

“Fine,” Stark said, rolling his eyes and smiling easily, “suit yourself.  I was just offering.”

“Offering what, exactly?” Loki scoffed, still tapping his foot, maintaining the ‘heartbeat’ essential to his necromantic spell. As if the mortal could possibly have anything Loki needed.

“You are like me; so I figured you get cranky if you don’t get laid often.” Stark shrugged, closing his eyes and raising his eyebrows, like he didn’t care at all. His whole body seemed to say ‘ _no big deal, right?_ ’.

Loki scowled, his eyes narrowing. _That_ was patently untrue. Stupid mortal, reducing Loki’s brilliant plans to ‘tantrums’, as if Loki would let his mood be ruled by something as petty as a lack of carnal fulfillment. “Let me guess,” he drawled nastily, “you offered yourself for the task?” He snorted. “To ’ _take one for the team,_ ’ as it were?”

Stark’s grin turned vicious. “No, I offered rent a prostitute for you, since that’s the only action you—“

Loki blasted him with magic, sending him flying into the wall, armor and all. ‘ _How dare you_?’ he wanted to say, but he was too busy fuming to put that into words. He advanced on Stark, intent on giving the _swine_ a lesson he wouldn’t soon forget.

It was only when Thor burst into the room and landed on Loki, hammer first, that Loki realized he’d forgotten to keep his foot beating.

As Thor put the seemingly-new magic-suppressing cuffs on his wrists, Stark flashed him a V sign, bleeding from the temple.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The sort of necromancy Loki is using was taken from the Dresden Files.


	2. who needs a friend with enemies like these

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sometimes you just gotta team up.

“So,” Stark said, “I need your expertise.” He waved a tablet in Loki’s direction.

Loki, trapped against an unexpectedly thick wall of glass, ignored him.

The indignity of being visible to his captors at all times and having absolutely no privacy was nothing compared to Stark’s cavalier way of just _sauntering_ into Loki’s space and expecting him to stand at attention. So he did the only thing left in his power to do: he rolled over in his cot, giving the intruder his back.

He was already uncomfortable enough — there was a dry booger that had been tickling his nose for the past three days and his balls were stuck to his thigh, but he didn’t dare fix either because he _knew_ he was being watched — there was no need to let Stark rattle him.

“Hey, Hannibal,” Stark said more pointedly, tapping the glass. “I’m talking to you.”

Loki curled up tighter under the thin cover, pressing his head tighter down on the flat pillow and covering his other ear with his hand. ‘ _Go away_ ,’ he thought as hard as he could, but whatever was dampening his magic worked only too well.

Instead of suddenly recalling he had something to do, Stark began detailing his toils to decode some relic or other recovered by this or that person from some such place.

Loki wasn’t really listening, more busy plotting out his next prank — this one would be actually harmful, instead of merely a distraction — but suddenly he caught a word.

 _Dreig_.

The butchered pronunciation didn’t prevent Loki from understanding him. _Ddraig._ Oh, the fool was trying to decode the Merlin scrolls!

Loki groaned softly, pained. He’d had such lofty plans for those scrolls. Capture a dragon, train it, gift it to Karnilla in exchange for bringing him along the next time she visited Asgard, infiltrating the vault and causing an interrealm incident so he could disguise his _real_ aim… All ruined.

And this _ape_ thought it was some sort of book of arcane spells!

The mortal was reading aloud from the scroll again, butchering the language almost beyond recognition, and then he stopped. “So, you gonna help or what?”

Loki considered it. It would mean he’d get to see the scrolls… And the cherry on top: he could feed Stark just enough bullshit to make what he translated unusable. Sighing tiredly, he propped himself up, then pushed until he was sitting sideways and turned around. “Let me see,” he said, making sure he sounded weary, like he’d given in only to shut Stark up.

The swine had the guts to grin as he opened the glass door and got inside, sitting on _Loki’s cot_ without even asking.

* * *

The scrolls were so interesting and the rest of the day so dull that soon Loki found himself looking forward to Stark’s visits.

There wasn’t just one dragon scroll — there were several. One dealt with the twelve uses of dragon blood (Stark snorted when Loki translates this bit), not all of which were the ones Loki is familiar with, as well as the magical properties of the rest of the creature. Another dealt with species, and yet another with spells.

But the true wealth lay in the fourth scrolls. It mapped out Faerie and which places connected to which ones on this side of the veil. Or, at least, as they had been in Merlin’s time. It also had a spell for rending said veil between the two worlds and thus, if one has read and knows well the map detailed above, being able to travel anywhere with very little expense of energy.

This, Loki filed for later use, and lied about the contents to Stark, claiming it was just a treatise on how young dragon riders ought to be instructed. Stark pulled a face and discarded the scroll, taking Loki at his word. 

It was the first time in a long while that anyone had trusted him so blindly.

* * *

One day, Stark took him to one of the higher levels so he could watch Loki perform one of the spells in the scrolls and attempt to reproduce it.

As soon as the cuffs came off, Loki showed him one: _Aparturum._ With a slight effort of will and a slicing gesture, he opened a Way into the Other Side. It was invisible — only Loki knew it was there.

“Did it work?” Stark asked, arching a brow. He looked faintly amused at Loki’s perceived failure.

For all answer, Loki gave him a two-fingered salute and vanished through it.

* * *

Apparently, Karnilla sold the secret of the dragons to Amora, because that’s what she used to attack next.

Loki wasn’t not too clear on what her aim was, and usually he’d be right there egging her on and helping out how he can, but right then? He was more interested in the gorgeous black dragon she had somehow enlisted into her service.

Stark and his merry band of bullies were there by the time he arrived, since the dragon that was currently wrapped around Stark Tower like ivy, its spiky tail lashing against the windows. They weren’t having much effect on the creature — aside from Mjolnir, but the dragon was big enough that she (it was definitely a ‘She’) could deflect _Thor_ when he tried to smash her.

Hawkeye was the first to spot Loki and he announced it with an arrow aimed at his left eye.

Loki plucked it out of the air and was holding it in his hand when Stark approached him, fearless like the time before.

“I drew the short straw,” he explained with his face mask up so he could look Loki in the eye. “Lucky me, huh? I get to fight _you._ ” He wagged his eyebrows.

Having no use or patience for the monkey’s antics, Loki just said, “Perhaps another day, if I can pencil you in,” and teleported to the top of the tower, right under the she-dragon’s nostrils. Using the very instructions he had read on the scrolls Stark had stolen from him, he charmed the dragon to his side by setting her free of Amora’s influence.

Of _course_ he hadn’t given all of the magicks over to Karnilla; he had needed insurance that the knowledge would not be used against him.

The Captain was the one who reached him first, having been close by when Loki began the unwinding of the spell, but he was still too late: Loki hopped onto Icefyre’s claw before Roger’s hand closed on him.

Loki waved at Stark when the dragon took him away.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Aparturum and the Nevernever (what I call "faerie" here because of course Merlin would land there) are, once again, concepts of the Dresden Files.


	3. who needs pornhub when you've got vine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sex is great, sex is wonderful, but what happens if someone brings something new to the bedroom? How creative can Loki's magic really be?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: dubious consent here. You know how it is with tentacle monsters.

Tony cautiously poked his head through the door, blood rushing in his ears, despite having already checked with Jarvis that the coast was clear.

Much as it hurt him to admit it, Jarvis wasn’t perfect; supervillains were clever, adapting to Tony’s increasing abilities like the flu virus adapted to vaccines. And Loki, who had somehow managed to infiltrate SHIELD all by his lonesome and turn it into a Jurassic nightmare, was wilier than all other bad guys put together. Tony shuddered to think what the guy could achieve if he had a goal other than just wreaking havoc and making their lives miserable for the lulz.

The room he saw had once upon a time been a bio laboratory, judging by the work benches and beakers; currently, it was a jungle.

No dinosaurs, which was nice. The raptors, tiny as they were, had almost bitten his metal boots off before he’d gotten away — what the heck was up with Loki’s fascination with dinosaurs anyway? The trees that had sprung from nowhere were enormous, with large crooked roots braking through the linoleum and branches pushing up against the ceiling. Thick vines curled up and up and up around the trunks, and hung like overcooked noodles from the canopy.

It was dark, as the leaves were obscuring the weak fluorescent tubes; Tony’d have to walk so he wouldn’t fly into hanging vines he couldn’t see and get tangled in them.

Just great.

Sighing, Tony landed the suit and began taking clunky steps. He should have learned his lesson from the ordeal with the Mark 42 and made it easier to walk in the suit, but no, his selective memory had helpfully forgotten to record the indignity of walking down stone stairs with a flightless titanium-gold coffin. Annoyed, he fired his repulsor at the space in front of him, decimating some hanging vines, and walked on.

As he made his way through the forest, his unease grew. He could have sworn he saw shit moving out the corner of his eye, but wherever he stared at said shit straight on, it was still as a rock in a desert. Creepy as all fuck.

Shivering slightly, and definitely not having Jurassic Park flashbacks, he made his way through the jungle. Suddenly, he heard a moan of pain and turned his head, searching through the green for whatever unlucky employee had not managed to escape. Not seeing where he was going, he snagged his boot on an outcrop of root he could have sworn wasn’t there before, and he tumbled forward. He fell face-first into the mattress of roots and vines of the jungle floor with a disgusting _squish_.

Cursing, he made to get up, but couldn’t, like the suit was suddenly unresponsive. Try as he might, no matter how hard he pushed against the floor, he didn’t move. “Jarvis?” he asked, blinking.

"There seems to be something holding you down, Sir," his AI replied. "I sense a slight magic in—oh, Sir, it’s infiltrating the suit." Did Jarvis sound panicked?

"What?" Tony yelped, panicking as well. But he was _feeling_ it, whatever it was, squirming against his ankle, having burrowed in through the gaps in the joint. "What the fuck?" he screamed, kicking, or at least trying to. He hoped it wasn’t a snake, because _holy shit_.

In what seemed almost no time, he lost his boot entirely, the whatever-it-was apparently sentient enough to figure out how to take it off. Other sentient prehensile limbs joined it in its task. The rest of his suit followed slowly, plate by plate, and soon the cool snake-y _things_ were squirming under Tony’s clothes.

 Tony freaked the fuck out and screamed into the com, receiving only silence in response.

“It’s no use,” a voice floated down from above, followed by a whimper.

Tony thought he recognized that voice — but no, it couldn’t be. Could it? Loki? He turned his head as far around as he could, still not believe that deep, rough voice was his.

What he saw was straight out a hentai fantasy: Loki was naked but for the rags that had been his clothes, trapped and pulled spread-eagle by a host of flexible branches, most of them with leaves still attached.

Tony’s neck hurt and he had to turn his face back down before he could watch his fill, but he didn’t think he had imagined the ends of two medium-thickness branches disappearing into his asshole, or the flush to Loki’s usually creamy skin. He blushed, himself, at seeing Loki so undone. “Your tentacle monster betrayed you, huh?” He tried not to sound too interested

Loki chuckled low in his throat, until he was cut off by a gentle moan. “Betrayed?” he asked breathily. “No, not at all. My construct is doing exactly what I designed it to do. Ah~!” He broke off in a silent scream, and _something warm_ splashed Tony’s back and neck. “I wasn’t fast enough to get away,” Loki finished in a rush, sounding immensely relieved.

Was this a tropical jungle, or was it just Tony who felt the heat? Because damn. When the vines moving on his shirt pulled it off his stomach, the cool air was incredibly refreshing. Holy shit. He was in the grip of a _tentacle monster_ , which was also holding its maker like a sexy puppet a few meters above him, and he was getting hard? This was ridiculous.

The vines — their roots, at least, soft and moist and warming closer to body temperature every second — felt him up over and under his clothes, seeking and burrowing in every hole and crevice they could find. They swelled under his shirt, as if trying to pull it off.

“Hey!” he complained, twitching and moving away as much as he could. “Stop that!” He slapped at the roots on his chest.

Loki laughed, suddenly a lot closer than before. He was on the floor now — Tony could see his perfect lily-white feet among the roots and cut-off pieces of vines — naked from even the rags. “I told you, there is no stopping it.”

“I’m not trying to stop it,” Tony said, just to be contrary. He made a spur of the moment decision: he was going to enjoy this. The creeping vines had startled him, sure, but if he’d been asked any other day of his life if he’d want to be in a live tentacle-sex fantasy, he’d have accepted on the spot. He turned his head to look into Loki’s face. “I’m trying to get it to let me up so I can take off my shirt. The under-armor is made not to tear easily.”

Loki tilted his head to the side, perplexed. “Truly?” he asked, stroking one of the really thick vines that was curling around a tree trunk. “You would enjoy _this_?”

Tony gave up on trying to uncurl the root around his chest and began squirming so the shirt of the under-armor shirt would ride up further on his chest. “Of course I would,” he grunted. “Who wouldn’t enjoy a hundred little fingers running all over their body?” Especially when Loki was watching? “People actually pay for this, you know?”

Suddenly, the vines from the canopy came down to snake around him and lifted him off the ground. The roots over his chest finally got the clue and slid Tony’s bunched shirt off over his head, dropping it off on the writhing floor. While some of the vines tried the same trick on the equally stretchy and resistant pants, the rest stroked over Tony’s body. Little tendrils stroked any bit of his skin they could reach: nipples, neck, the hollows under his ribs, into his ears…

It tickled. Tony laughed at the plant’s enthusiasm and held his arms and legs apart, surrendering completely to its affections. Suddenly, re remembered Loki was there and looked for him. “Enjoying the view, huh?” he asked.

Loki was a bit pink around his cheekbones, but other than that he was as unreadable as ever. Sure, there was a tiny smirk playing on his lips, but that was always there. It meant nothing. “I should have known. You _are_ infamously hedonistic, after all.” He unglued himself from the tree and approached Tony, walking through the vines as easily as Legolas in the Lord of the Rings movies.

The vines had gotten hold of Tony’s dick and were now stroking it. A thin tendril was currently loitering around the tip, teetering on the edge of snaking into the slit.

Tony didn’t know how he felt about that. He’d never been into sounding as a kink, especially not after numerous stays in the hospital, but somehow the fact that Loki was watching made him want it. “Come on,” he urged it, thrusting into it invitingly. “Just do it.”

As if it had heard him, the curious little vine obeyed, worming its way into his ureter. It was thin enough not to stretch anything unduly, and its surface was smooth so it didn’t scratch or even irritate. It was also nicely warm.

It did make him feel like he needed to pee, but it felt good. Tony moaned softly, relaxing as more vines ran through his hair and over his nipples. “Hm, no wonder you let it catch you,” he groaned, his eyes closing. “This feels amazing.”

“Indeed,” Loki agreed, standing just far enough that he could see everything that was going on. “I had planned this as a distraction while I stole the rest of the Merlin scrolls, you know?” He tapped his chin and looked pensively at Tony.

Tony flushed, the back of his neck and his chest going hot and pink. “Well, go get ‘em, Tiger.” He made a shooing motion with his hands, having no desire for Loki to watch him get off on being rolled around in plant spaghetti. It wasn’t like the scrolls were even there; they were in Tony’s tower.

Second strike for Loki, the first one having been getting caught in his own trap.

But Loki smirked and wagged a finger at Tony. “I don’t think so, Ape.” No, wait, the finger wasn’t wagging — it was circling. Loki was doing something.

Tony’s stomach almost dropped — he really needed to stop trusting Loki — but the vines didn’t strangle him or suffocate him or anything. Instead, he felt something wet and warm trickling out of his ass. Too runny to be the first obvious thing — thank fuck, because he’d never live it down if he shat himself in front of Loki — so it had to be some sort of lube. “Erm, what is that?” he asked, trying not to sound too alarmed.

The finger stopped drawing spirals in the air. Loki’s smirk turned smug. “You’ll see.” With a wink, he turned around and gathered clothes to himself from the shadows.

Then, as he walked the way Tony had come, three finger-wide vines separated from the bunch fisting his cock and crept up his perineum. One by one, they slid into Tony, twirling around each other inside him to form a spiraling prong.

Tony moaned out loud as the bumpy texture ran repeatedly over his anus and prostate. No cock or dildo he’d ever taken had felt this good, especially because he tended to shy away from the weirdly shaped toys. He was regretting that fear now — it felt _fantastic._

He was abruptly very thankful that Loki wasn’t there to witness this, because in less than five seconds of this treatment he was a writhing, whimpering hot mess.

The tendrils still caressed his skin and scalp almost affectionately, playing with his nipples and balls, tangling in his hair, intertwining with his toes. They stroked his neck and armpits and the back of his knees, which until that moment he hadn’t realized were an erogenous zone. The one inside his cock kept fucking his slit, pulling back and then burrowing in again once more; the ones around it compressed by sections, mimicking a swallowing throat. The vines up his ass parted and twirled clockwise, then anticlockwise, a constant thrumming sensation right over his prostate, stretching his rim to the edge of pleasure-pain.

It was a miracle he lasted more than two minutes. Or rather, whatever sentience was in the plant was the miracle: it knew just how much was enough to keep him right on the bring but not send him over, and he teetered there, turning his face to muffle his screaming moans against a vine but otherwise completely surrendering to the pleasure.

He nearly passed out when he came, jizz shooting out of his cock like from a squirt gun, coating the roots and vines around his chest.

Tribute paid, the vines carefully laid him back down onto the soft mass of roots that carpeted the floor, before retreating from his body. The last one to go was the one in his ureter. It gave his cock a last stroke — longing? — before disappearing.

As Tony lay there, panting and smiling wider than he had in his life, he thought, ‘ _How polite_ ,’ and then, closely following that, ‘ _Great. Now I have a new kink._ ’ His body felt like putty and he would have loved to stay just there and take a nap. Groaning, Tony pushed himself to his feet and got dressed.

There was a supervillain to stop. …If he was even still around.


	4. who needs style when you have magic

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Magic rituals require special clothes.

Thor came back from Asgard with gifts. He’d gone because of an emergency of some description — some sort of diplomatic incident with Hornheim or whatever it was called, Tony wasn’t paying much attention when the hot chick in the armor came to get Thor — but he’d certainly not forgotten his human friends.

For Steve he brought a pitcher of an Asgardian drink guaranteed to get him drunk. For Clint, a book. (Everyone was surprised at that, until Clint opened it and saw it was full of ribald limericks. He added a lot of insults from it into his repertoire.) For Natasha, a dress in the Asgardian fashion — it was also armor, made from fantastical materials so that even the silk of the skirts was strong enough to deflect swords. For Bruce, a blanket woven by Frigga herself. It depicted a garden with hidden animals, but they changed spots when you weren’t looking.

For Tony, he brought books of magic — a chest full of them — and said that they weren’t being used on Asgard.

Tony discovered why upon opening a book that promised to be for beginners and finding something written on the first page:

_Sweet child,_

_I hope you’ll find this as enlightening as I did at your age._

_Love,_

_Frigga_.

Yeah, this was definitely not _Thor_ ’s first spellbook.

Tony read it in one sitting, enjoying the annotations on the margins, even as almost illegible with childish handwriting and faded as they were. Some of them were very insightful, others were hilarious, like the one next to an incantations to weaken metal, ‘ _Used this on Thor’s shield. That will teach him to respect magic._ ’ It was evident from the notes that Loki had re-read this book often, as the handwriting was better sometimes, the comments more mature or cross-referencing other books.

In fact, he discovered later, there was not one book left un-commented on. It was like reading the Wikipedia on paper: one moment he would be reading about the magical properties of Poppies, then a note next to a mention of the Bruise Vanishing salve gave him the book and page where the recipe for that might be found, and then the recipe had the locations of the treatises on each ingredient or method of preparation written next to them.

It was actually pretty amazing, going through the books. He learned _a lot_ about magic, sure, but he also got to know Loki in a way he’d never anticipated.

Tony learned that Loki was an _incredibly_ thorough person. Not only had he combed through the books and cross-referenced _everything_ , he’d also tested the potions and rituals and spells meant to be engraved into things and found ways to improve them.

Suddenly, his infatuation with the charming, irreverent, handsome little shit became a full blown crush on his brain. He mourned all the time he had wasted that time he’d gotten Loki to stay put for a whole fortnight. God, screw the prison cell; he should have shipped Loki down to the lab the second they got to Stark Tower.

Tony hoped Loki never found out he had these…

* * *

About two months after the thing with the vines, which still fueled Tony’s masturbatory fantasies, Tony decided to try his first spell. A simple one: he tried to make something move by moving something else.

Loki’s books called this Thaumaturgy or, the ones that looked something other than Asgardian, Sympathy. The essential principle was a bit like quantum entanglement: take a piece from the whole, and that piece will share a sympathetic connection to that whole. You could send energy down that connection — heat, kinetic or magical energy — or use it to find the bigger part.

Tony called it Voodoo.

He started easy. Lower than beginner; this was downright _street-vendor-demo_ level. He took a piece of silver — Loki’s texts said was the metal easiest to work magic on, aside from something called _Uru_ — and cut off a corner with his trusty laser cutter. The books said that the trick for this to work was _knowing_ there was a connection between the two things — or tricking yourself into believing in a connection, like how when you were working with two different pieces of metal you could pretend they came from the same block — so yeah, connection, check.

He lifted the tiny piece, fully believing the other would be similarly affected, just _expecting_ it to rise into the air because hello, scientific fact, tested over and over by Loki himself.

Nothing happened.

* * *

Tony didn’t let the failure discourage him.

Okay, so he totally did, but he got over it soonish after declaring only the once that magic was bullshit. He decided to try a ritual instead, because the books said they would work independently of the magical ability of whoever did them. After reading into rituals to educate himself, Tony decided they were basically vending machines: put coin in, get candy.

Definitely up his alley.

Although the part where he had to wait until the full moon, take a million baths, rub his skin with salt, dress in a flimsy white tunic and burn a candle in the woods next to still water while he buried an acorn sounded a bit like a charlatan’s mumbo-jumbo for his tastes.

As the suit retracted from his body into a suitcase, leaving him clad only in an oversized white t-shirt that reached down to his knees, Tony could only hope that Central Park was woods-y enough and the t-shirt tunic-y enough for the ritual. He’d splurged on the candle just in case, buying a scented one with pressed flowers inside for extra magic.

The ritual was a simple thing for good luck. It would be difficult to measure, but Tony would manage — the other rituals in the book were too complicated, useless for him, or just plain cruel.

So Tony sucked it up and walked closer to the shore of the lake barefoot. The grass under his feet pinched and poked, and he was sure he was gonna end up stepping on dogshit barefoot sooner or later, but he was already committed to the indignity. He bore the discomfort with as much aplomb as he could, only cursing twice and under his breath at that. When he reached the shore, he took out the acorn he’d conned Steve into getting for him.

Feeling like an idiot, he held it up so it could be “bathed in moonlight”, as the book called it, and turned around seven times. Lucky number, indeed. Then he knelt and took out the candle and the lighter. The stones of the shore were harsh on his knees and there was enough of an Autumn breeze snaking under the hem of his long t-shirt to make his balls shrink up into his body, but he lit the candle anyway and held the acorn over the flame. The hot air was extremely unpleasant on his skin, but he persevered.

He had no idea what this was supposed to do — how was planting a burned and soaked acorn supposed to bring him good luck? — but yeah, vending machine; he wasn’t about to gonna argue with it.

When the acorn was browner with scented soot, he took it by the tip and dipped it in the lake water three times. Done, he kept the candle burning as per instructed and got to his feet. Wincing with every step, he walked over to a spot with trees and knelt again. He said the words he’d memorized as he dug a hole into the cold soil with his numb fingers. Finally he dropped the acorn in and covered it with soil.

Then he heard the incomparable sound of someone clapping slowly.

Aw, _fuck_. He sure hoped whoever it was hadn’t filmed this. He could already see tomorrow’s headlines: “CEO of Stark Industries Tries To Summon Fairies,” or some shit.

“Well done,” the person said still clapping sarcastically.

Tony almost fell over with relief. It was just Loki. Good. Him, he could deal with. “We’ve got to stop meeting like this,” he said for all greeting, looking in the direction of the footsteps. He held up a hand, silently requesting Loki’s help getting up.

Loki arched an eyebrow at it, and then locked gazes with Tony and grinned mischievously. “Oh? But it is so much fun,” he drawled. His eyes continued past the line of Tony’s body, watching the spot where he’d buried the acorn. “That’s not going to work, you know?”

Tony lowered his hand, slightly disappointed (why had he been expecting Loki to just casually take hold of it and pull him to his feet?), and got up. He tried not to flash Loki as he did it, but he didn’t think he’d managed. ‘ _Mental note, wear longer tunic next time._ ’ “Why are you so sure?”

Shrugging, Loki gestured upwards. “The ritual you used, I think, is from Alfheim. They don’t have a moon.” He gave Tony as flat look, as though he should have known better.

No moon? “Then why the fuck did the ritual call for it to be done on the night of a full moon?” Tony challenged, crossing his arms over his chest.

Loki snorted. “It’s code, you brainless cockroach. The ‘moonlight’ is an alcoholic beverage made from delvenberries, and they store it in spherical containers.” He shook his head, as if not believing anyone could _possibly_ be this stupid. “There is no word for either of them in Allspeak, so whatever brainless moron visited Alfheim first saw the container and decided it looked like a moon.”

The vagaries of language. Tony facepalmed. “Let me guess, the drink is silvery in color.” He didn’t actually need Loki’s clarification. The acorn was to be soaked in _liquor._ That actually made sense; everyone felt lucky with a little alcohol in them. Eh, it would be no biggie to repeat the ritual, only soaking the acorn in a White Russian…

Loki hummed and looked up at the moon. The Earthian moonlight reflected off his face and eyes but not his hair, making him look ethereal. “The season for delventrees is Autumn. There they collect the fruit, mash it, strain it, and fill the moons with the juice. It’s left to ferment until Midsummer, their fertility festival, where they drink it all.”

Tony nodded. “So that would be the ‘night of the full moon’,” he deduced. Then he froze, horrified.

Liquor for lowered inhibitions. Fire representing passion, libido, maybe life-force itself. Water and soil — the ‘womb’ and the nutrients? Fertility festivals weren’t just for asking the gods for good crops; they were _sex_ festivals.

A ritual for luck, indeed — luck in _getting pregnant_!

He groaned and hit his forehead with the heel of his hand. “Aw, fuck,” he whined, stomping his foot. All this waiting, all this preparation, to ask for a pregnancy from a goddess of some description.  “You’re right, it was never going to work no matter what.” He dragged his hand down his face. “Men can’t get pregnant.”

Loki grinned, looking more fey than ever with the lights dancing in his eyes. “Mortal men. But you worked it out quickly,” he observed. “You may not be as stupid as I initially thought, human.”

Great. _What_ an endorsement. Tony should put that in his CV. He decided to change the subject. “So, what brought you here?” he asked, trying not to shiver too much in the cold. He should have brought shoes, at least. Or socks.

“I saw you landing here,” Loki said, his eyes following Tony’s arms as they crossed over his chest for warmth. “With no villain in sight. I was understandably intrigued.” He blinked, and then added, in the same breath, “Aren’t you cold?”

Tony’s knees were rubbing together, he was pressing his legs so close. “Yup,” he nodded, “intensely. Why?”

Wordlessly, Loki took off his overcoat and put it around Tony’s shoulders.

It was toasty warm on Tony’s chilled skin, and he closed his eyes in relief, putting his arms into the sleeves. “Thank you, Loki,” he said, carefully avoiding asking why he’d done it. He didn’t want Loki to take it back just because he might misconstrue it as Tony being ungrateful.

Loki shrugged, looking perfectly at ease with the temperature. “I expect it back,” he spoke haughtily. “Leave it here at this time tomorrow.”

Then he vanished.

Tony stared at the spot where he’d been, feeling oddly bereft. He buried his nose in the collar of the coat and took a deep breath. Loki smelled nice.

* * *

The next night, Tony returned to the spot to drop off the coat.

He left it draped over the chest filled with Loki’s books.


	5. who needs swords when you have words

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Why pin your hopes on what-ifs and alternate universes when you can alter your own to fit you better?

Loki sat at the bar, nursing the same drink he’d been nursing for the past fifteen minutes. Midgardian drinks were offensive to his educated palate; to be fair, so was the Asgardian ale that Thor often praised. He was waiting for someone. The parcel he would give his dwarven contact was safely hidden under his draped coat.

Someone took the spot next to him, finally. Loki turned to chastise Grór for being late, and his face promptly fell. “Oh, it’s you.”

“Wow, such enthusiasm,” Stark replied, grinning cheekily. He seemed completely unaffected by Loki’s curt welcome as he flagged down the bartender and ordered a drink.

Loki sighed. He was in no mood to deal with the mortal tonight, amusing as he had proven to be their past few encounters. “I am expecting someone, Stark.”

The ape’s grin got larger. “That’s what they all say, Prancer.” He chuckled at some private joke Loki didn’t understand.

Rolling his eyes, Loki grabbed his things from the next stool over and gracefully shifted his ass there. He then deposited the package with the pamphlets and his coat on the recently vacated spot.

“Aw, come on!” the ape complained with a dramatic roll of his eyes. “What, are you afraid your blind date will choose me over you if we sit too close?” He blinked at Loki in a way he probably thought charming.

Loki did not want to explain himself. Weren’t the mortals supposed to be big on personal freedoms? How come only Loki had to support his beliefs and feelings with a list of evidence and two essays? He scoffed and pointedly turned in his stool so he his back was facing Stark.

But the monkey was not to be deterred. “Give me five minutes.”

Loki pretended to sip at his sickeningly sweet cocktail and looked at his watch. Grór was fifteen whole minutes late. Too bad Loki needed this meeting to happen more than the idiot dwarf, or else he’d already be long gone.

“Come on, it’ll be fun,” Stark continued, sounding much closer now. “I’ll buy you a drink,” he offered, as though that was some sort of prize.

Exasperated, Loki turned to give the bane of his night a piece of his mind—

Only to find Stark seated on the stool Loki had previously vacated, holding Loki’s coat and Loki’s parcel in his lap.

 _‘The sheer nerve,_ ’ Loki seethed, wanting nothing more than to grab the walking insult by his throat and make him eat Loki’s cocktail, glass and all. “Are you deaf, as well as stupid?” he hissed, top lip curling in distaste. “What part of ‘no’ can you not comprehend?”

Stark _smirked._ “The part where you’re sitting there all alone.” He lifted his drink in a toast and threw it back. “Ah, I’d almost forgotten the taste of crappy liquor.” He put the glass down and leaned on the bar nonchalantly. “You need to start frequenting better places, Bambi. Bars like these?” He twirled a finer in a wide circle, indicating the whole establishment. “Way beneath us.”  


Loki glanced at his watch. Twenty minutes, and no dwarf. Either Grór had decided this wasn’t worth his time (doubtful) or he had been detained. As the second in command to his little down-with-the-system rebellion, the second was more likely. And sitting here all alone would look suspicious. Much to his dismay, Stark might actually be a half-decent cover. But first… “My coat,” he said, extending his hand with the palm facing up.

“Oh, come on! Don’t run away,” the imbecilic _ant_ entreated, but he handed the coat over anyway.

It was the same one Loki had lent him a few months ago, when he had taken pity on the man’s failed magicks out of some misguided sense of empathy. “I’m not, I just want it where I can see it.” He draped it over his legs. The package wrapped in brown paper, however, he didn’t care so much about. “I want coffee, if you please. Your species substandard beverages don’t please me.”

Stark looked him up and down. “I think I know the perfect one for you, though.” He ordered something called a White Russian for Loki, and a Black one for himself, mumbling something about high cholesterol. While they waited for it, he turned to Loki and murmured, “If you don’t like that one, I’ll get you a real coffee.”

“Fair enough, I suppose,” Loki sighed. He really wasn’t in the mood, but it would help pass the time. If he hated it, though, he was pouring it over the talking monkey’s head, unspoken truce or no unspoken truce. He wondered, not for the last time, what in the Nine Realms was keeping Grór. He hoped it was not Odin.

Stark drummed his fingers on the bar restlessly. “Say, Your Surliness, what’s with the package?” He inclined his head towards it. “The wrapping paper is a bit drab for a gift. Your date will be disappointed.”

Shrugging, Loki gestured towards it. “Not a gift.” He didn’t bother correcting the mortal’s notions about the nature of his encounter with Grór, as it was none of his business. “A commission. Feel free to peruse it.” In fact, he could use the man’s opinion.

The drinks arrived, along with an arched eyebrow from the bartender directed at Stark, who was too busy carefully tearing off scotch tape to notice. One of them was dark brown, like Coke; the other looked like milk and very, very pale coffee.

Deducing this second one was the famed ‘White Russian’, Loki took it and sipped carefully. The first thing he noticed was how dense the liquid was. Then, the overpowering flavor of cream and, hidden under it, the alcohol and the intense favor of coffee. Interesting. The cream made it bearable.

“What the hell is this?” Stark demanded, interrupting Loki’s tasting. “The Spark notes on The Social Contract?” He waved one of the four hundred pamphlets under Loki’s nose.

Loki smirked. “For the dwarves,” he said casually, sipping a little more of his creamy drink. It was pretty good, not that he was about to tell Stark that. “They’re organizing a revolution against a tyrannical dictator and need more followers.” He shrugged. Why not tell him, right? Stark was supposed to be fight against that sort of thing; he wouldn’t hold it against Loki.

Stark gaped, completely at a loss for words. He shook his head in wonderment, slapping the pamphlet in his hand with his knuckles. “A revolution.” He huffed incredulously. “Is this your idea of a good time?”

Almost finished with his drink — why did Midgardians make their glasses to tiny? — Loki grabbed Stark’s and gave it a sip. He wrinkled his nose and put it down immediately afterwards, disliking the bitter burn on his tongue. “Not particularly. But said tyrannical dictator happens to be Odin, so…” He gave the mortal a cheeky wink and finished his creamy drink. “Another.”

Stark’s eyes flew to the glass. “Oh, right, sure.” He waved at the bartender and gestured for another of the off-white drink. “That explains why Thor was so adamant that we stop the dwarf.” He nodded to himself. “I have to hand it to you, starting revolutions in Odin’s empire to get your revenge? Sneaky.” He clapped Loki’s shoulder.

Loki nearly tore the man’s hand from his wrist, shaking it off quite roughly. Whenever had he given Stark any indication that this sort of familiarity would be tolerated? Then he froze. Slowly, he slumped over and put his face in his hand. “Oh, fuck. Odin knows.”

Rubbing his forearm absently to check for injuries, Stark replied. “Yep. Although I never pegged Thor for being one to support a tyrannical dictator.” He said this pointedly, implying Loki was lying about this.

The story of his life. “We were raised to believe everything Odin said and did was right, no matter how crazy or cruel,” Loki explained. The new batch of drinks arrived; he dipped a finger in the creamy concoction and sucked it clean. “I had my eyes opened, rather violently at that. Thor is covering his own with his hands so he won’t _see_.” That was all he was going to say on the subject.

Humming, Stark lifted his glass to his mouth. “Cheers. I know a thing or two about asshole parents.” The corner of his mouth curled up as he sipped. “Though I admit yours takes the cake.”

Loki shared a complicit smile with him. The man was pretty good company, when he wasn’t being a wiseass.

They clinked their glasses together and drank in companionable silence.

At some point, when they received the third round of drinks (Loki was sticking with the creamy thing; Stark had asked for the bartender to surprise him), Stark pointed at Loki silently for a few seconds and then said, “You know what? I think you and I could have been pretty good friends, if things had gone differently.”

The announcement startled Loki, who pulled back slightly. Was Stark drunk already? “Erm, we are friends in,” he paused to count, “at least three alternate realities that I know of. In one of those,” he smirked, “you are a supervillain and my favorite ally.”  


Stark looked completely baffled. He’d frozen with his new drink halfway to his mouth; now it hung in midair, tilted slightly. “You’re _joking,_ ” he demanded. Then his brow crinkled. “Or aren’t you?” He finished his drink in one gulp and watched Loki like he held all the answers to the questions of life, the universe and everything. “Pics or it didn’t happen.”

Loki smirked, swirling the White Russian around in his glass. “Fine, I’ll show you.” He asked the bartender for water and one of the little silver bowls that came with peanuts for people who ordered beers, and assembled a makeshift scrying bowl. He waved his hands over the surface several times, connecting the reflection to that of another world through Yggdrasil.

Finally, he came across a picture of himself and Stark sitting on a couch, apparently watching a game. There was no circle of blue in Stark’s chest.

“Dude, we look so young,” Stark murmured, close by. He was peering down over Loki’s shoulder. “Is that an MIT banner on the wall?”

Loki nodded. “I appear to be human, or at least passing as one.”

Suddenly, the little figures in the bowl turned towards each other and started kissing.

Stark let out an ungainly squawk, and then laughed uproariously. “You’re my gay boyfriend!” he exclaimed, tickled by the notion. He watched the figures make out on the couch with a curious glint in his eyes and muttered under his breath, “There's a world out there where you didn’t turn me down, huh? There's still hope.” He looked Loki in the eye and said, in his normal voice, “Show me another.”

Electing to ignore the comment — Stark had never propositioned him that he was aware — Loki did as asked. “In this one, I think _you_ turned _me_ down.”

This time, Stark-in-the-bowl was entering a building stealthily, gun in his hand. He was wearing a blue bulletproof vest that said ‘FBI’ on it. He and a woman with strawberry-blond hair in the same sort of vest kicked down a door. Inside, Loki-in-the-bowl raised his hands. A blood-soaked knife clattered onto the floor. Hanging from a hook in the ceiling was the naked and corpse of a man. Loki-in-the-bowl had been carving it up.  


Stark made a gagging sound. “Serial killer. Why does that not surprise me?” He rolled his eyes. “Such a drama queen.” He watched as his image on the water threw Loki’s to the dirty ground and cuffed him, and then said, “Show me another one?”

Loki shrugged and swiped his hand over the water. The picture changed again.

This time, it was like a medieval fantasy movie. Stark-in-the-bowl was attired as a prince might be, in chainmail and a coronet. Loki-in-the-bowl appeared to be some sort of fae creature. Loki was teaching the prince magic, if the lights and explosions were anything to go by.

“Huh, look at that,” Stark murmured. He reached out to poke the water, and the image disappeared in the ripples. “Oops.” He turned a sheepish smile at Loki.

It was only then that Loki realized there was a hand on his waist. Stark’s, obviously, but what was it doing there? It wasn’t terribly uncomfortable — he hadn’t even noticed it, really — so he said nothing on the subject. But he didn’t like the way Stark was looking at him. “I must leave now,” he said, gently pushing the mortal’s grubby paws aside.

Stark’s face fell. “Oh, okay, yeah.” He grabbed the parcel with the pamphlets and held it out to Loki. “I guess you’re busy, with the bringing-down-dictators thing and whatnot.” He gave Loki a grin. “Good luck?”

Of course the mortal didn’t mean it, but Loki was strangely touched by the sentiment. “It’s appreciated,” he said, and vanished.


	6. who needs to feel when you can just deny, deny, deny

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Things always have to start somewhere.

Loki spent about four days in Nidavellir making sure the rebellion was going to happen, no take-backs. Once the political crisis reached critical mass, Loki decided it was time to — as the mortals so charmingly put it — blow the popsicle stand.

Loki arrived in his apartment tired, hungry, and in need of a proper bath (the dwarves had mud baths only, maggots that they were, and only twice a month at that).

The first thing he did was make himself a tuna sandwich with everything that hadn't gone off in his fridge. He ate it while soaking in his bathtub — not really caring if the bread got wet — and reflecting about his resounding success.

The dwarves had loved the pamphlets. They passed them along like good ale, getting redder and redder in their ugly pale faces the more they discussed the ideology inside, making Loki's words their own. They even got _mysteriously_ passed up the hierarchy, to the point that even the puppet king had one and read it when he was sure Odin wasn't looking. Loki had, _ahem_ , no idea how that had happened.

Maybe, he thought, he should do this for a living. Drop his schemes and use his silver tongue to get things done. Like the politicians in the movies. 'President Loki' had a nice ring to it — much nicer than 'Odin Allfather'. Chuckling, he finished washing himself clean of the stink of dwarves and got to bed.

Right before he went to sleep, he wondered what Stark was up to.

* * *

Opening a Way didn't take much energy, but walking across it? Exhausting. And he hadn't had the chance to nap after travelling to Nidavellir, so the exhaustion hadn't doubled, it had squared.

Loki slept for two days.

When he woke up, all he cared about was having another meal, and a large one at that. It was four in the morning, and the only places open where he could get food were fast-food chains, so he quickly made his appearance at the closest Burger King.

The casher looked at him knowingly as he packed fifteen cheeseburgers into Loki's takeaway bag, saying this was the first time he'd seen someone take 'four twenty' so literally.

Loki smiled at him pleasantly enough, despite the reference having gone over his head, and took his bag. He devoured one immediately, balling up the wrapper and tossing it behind the counter, and juggled with the bag so he could peel another one as he left the establishment.

He bumped into someone at the door and the burger fell out of his hand.

The man caught it deftly and offered it back to him. "Sorry about—Loki?"

Loki peered down at him. "Stark," he deadpanned, hiding his surprise. He snatched his meal and bit into it savagely. "What brings you here at this hour?" he said, though it came muffled by the burger.

Stark shrugged. "Much the same as you, I suppose. Looked up from the new bow I'm making for Hawkweye and 'grrrr' goes my stomach." He patted his belly, grinning. "Wanna share a table?"

Holding up the take-out bag as evidence, Loki replied. "I wasn't planning on staying."

"Oh, yeah," Stark snapped his fingers in recall. "Your apartment is like two blocks away."

What?

The mortal grinned and grabbed a petrified Loki's sleeve, turning him around. "Give me five minutes to order, and we can go there."

Loki blinked and tore his arm from Stark's hold. He glared at him stormily, not sure what to think. "How long have you known?" he demanded, fingers clenching in the paper bag.

"About…" Stark pauses, thinking about it and counting on his fingers, "…months, I think. I planted a tracker on you last time we had you—oh, I'm next, hang on." And just like that, he turned away from Loki and towards the cashier, completely ignoring Loki in favor of ordering two cheeseburgers and a salad for himself.

Loki's heart skipped a beat. That long? The Avengers could have him wire-tapped and he wouldn't have noticed. Had they put cameras in his apartment? If they had gone in and touched his stuff, he'd kill them, regardless of any sliver of fondness he might have held for them despite their penchant for ruining his plans. He'd just come into _their_ homes at night — let's see how they like it — and slit their throats in their sleep.

"…Loki?" Stark was saying, hesitantly touching his elbow. "Hey, where did you go?"

Loki looked at him with impenetrable but wide eyes; something that could be called a glare if he hadn't felt so lost. "I'll kill you," he whispered, voice rolling thick with promise.

"Whoa!" The ant held his takeout bag protectively over his chest and took a step back. "What? What's that for? I didn't do anything!"

For an answer, Loki shook his head at him and walked away.

"Hey!" Stark shouted, "Wait up!"

Loki turned himself invisible upon crossing the threshold. He watched as Stark ran out after him, looked around for a good long while, and finally sighed and kicked a nearby trashcan.

"Your one chance, Stark," Stark muttered through gritted teeth. "One chance and you _blew it_." He smacked his temple. "Fuck!"

Loki watched him get in his car and drive away, and then returned home.

* * *

Loki devoured cheeseburger after cheeseburger as he watched mindless late-night television. It couldn't hold his attention for long, and he found himself wondering about Stark.

The first thing he'd done after arriving home was check for bugs. He'd come up with nothing. Stark had known where Loki lived and slept and ate for 'about four months' and he hadn't done anything with that knowledge except attempt to invite himself over. Loki hadn't seen it as such before, but he understood it now: the mortal wanted to spend time with him.

No ulterior motives. No tricking Loki into letting his guard down. Just that. It was a novel experience.

Abruptly, Loki recalled Stark's words. _T_ _here's a world out there where you didn’t turn me down, huh?_ When, exactly, had the man _offered_? No matter how hard he pondered, he could not figure it out. He would remember rejecting him, wouldn’t he? Truth be told, he might have forgotten; Stark had only began registering when Loki saw him attempting to do magic.

Loki ate his last cheeseburger and turned off the TV. He laid down on the couch and stared at the ceiling, thinking.

He hugged a pillow to his chest and turned onto his side to watch the sunrise.

What if he gave Stark the chance he so desperately wanted?


	7. who needs a plan with luck like this

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> When you are Tony Stark, not even first kisses are sacred from the paps.

Sometimes, Tony wondered if there was such a thing as pseudo-dating. 

And by “a thing,” he meant like how pseudocyesis was a thing. If some women’s brains could convince themselves the body was pregnant and actually start secreting the appropriate hormones and stuff, why couldn’t his brain trick itself into secreting pain-bonding hormones and convincing itself Tony was dating Loki, right?

Hey, it could happen. It wasn’t his fault that he and Loki had done some things that could be considered vaguely relationship-ish under a certain light.

Like the time Loki had lived in Tony’s home for several days. Granted, he’d done it under duress and spent more than half the time locked up in a cell, but still. And even if you didn’t count that, there was the snafu with the pregnancy potion in the park. With a little creativity, it could be interpreted as a walk in the park under the light of the full moon; all terribly romantic. And Tony hadn’t exactly showered him in gifts, but he _had_ given Loki books with enormous emotional value. They’d gone for drinks, too, and also had a dinner date, for certain values of ‘dinner’ and ‘date’. Hell, they'd even had sex by proxy, or at the very least witnessed each other being fucked silly by the same sentient plant.

Maybe years of movies and books had conditioned his brain to consider certain things romantic and release dopamine whenever he did that sort of crap, and it’d gotten so used to feeling good around Loki by association that it secreted serotonin whenever Tony thought of him. Oxytocin and vasopressin were the next logical step.

It made perfect sense! It would certainly explain why he was having so much trouble with securing a hookup, even with the amount of alcohol he and his potential partners had ingested. It wasn’t that he didn’t have the infamous raw Stark animal magnetism anymore; it was just that he couldn’t muster a drop of interest in them because his brain was _obsessed with the imaginary relationship he didn’t have with Loki._

Aw, shit, he was fucked.

Sighing, Tony kicked an empty beer can out of his way. It barely glinted reproachfully at him, reflecting the light of the lamp outside the bar’s backdoor. Rolling his eyes and cursing Bruce’s pipedreams about humans living in harmony with nature for rubbing off on him, he picked it up and tossed it in the closest trashcan. He drew the line at picking up the rest of the trash, though; if he tried to clean up this alley with his current blood-alcohol level, he’d probably end up sleeping in the dumpster. He sighed again and pulled the door open, the muffled sound of music getting louder.

“You seem to be in a black mood,” someone said from behind him; the voice poured into Tony’s ear like melted chocolate, all the way to the middle of his chest, filling him with heat.

Hey, wait. Tony _knew_ that voice.

He turned around, not quite believing his ears, and found himself at eye-level with a very enticing pair of clavicles, bared by a silky shirt with the three top buttons undone. He immediately straightened and lifted his eyes to the pair of glowing green lanterns peering down at him. “Loki!” he exclaimed, irrationally happy to see him. He'd blame it on the alcohol. “Night off, or are we in the middle of a new plot?”

Loki merely blinked at him, looking completely at home with the city's night life, what with his messy metal-head hair and his nightmare-black clothes. All he was missing to fit right in with the scream-o crowd was a little eyeliner, black lipstick and some hair gel, which Tony was actually glad he wasn't wearing or he might have ended up planting a kiss on his unsuspecting frown.

Frown?

Right. Better turn the wattage down. Tony forced his grin into a small welcoming smile. He couldn’t help the puffing out of his chest, though. “‘Sup?”

Loki's shoulder rose in a shrug; a move that looked so liquid it wouldn't have been out of place on a black panther. He spread his hands like an innocent man. “No plots." His penetrating gaze left Tony's eyes to watch over his shoulder. "Are you going in?" he asked with his voice like smoke and mirrors, flicking his chin up slightly.

Tony was _not_ going to miss this chance. "Sure." He moved aside, holding the door open for Loki. "Buy you a drink?"

Lips curling in a smirk, Loki bowed his head to fit through the doorway and entered the building.

* * *

Somehow, Tony conned Loki into dancing with him. He didn't remember the particulars of how he managed it, nor did he care, but it went something like this:

  * Buy Loki several rounds of different drinks he thought the thousand-year-old alien would-be conqueror would like.
  * Stand a little closer than he would have if he'd been sober, mainly because alcohol dulled his sense of self-preservation a bit.
  * Marvel when Loki didn't pull away.
  * Stand even closer.
  * Watch Loki be chatted up by a very sexy woman with sultry eyes, just enough makeup and the best body Tony had seen in a while.
  * Put his arm around Loki's waist and pulled them flush together, winking at the woman pointedly but politely.
  * Marvel, again, when Loki didn't pull away and instead reached down lace his fingers with Tony's.
  * Stand paralyzed like an idiot while Loki whispered in his ear.
  * Try to remember how to breathe as Loki laughed mischievously and pulled him to the dance floor.
  * Try not to drown in Loki's scent — cologne? perfume? natural pheromones? — as Loki rubbed against him in all the good ways to the deep thrum of dubstep.



Okay, so maybe it was Loki who conned Tony into dancing. Same difference. It ended with Loki letting him put his hands — and, later, mouth — all over his person, so Tony counted it a win.

They were in fact sitting on a booth, Tony so close to Loki he was practically on his lap, when Tony licked his lips, gathered his courage, and went in for a kiss.

Loki — clever, dark, enticing, dangerous Loki — met him halfway.

* * *

Tony woke in his bed, hungover and alone. The last thing he could remember from last night was Loki's tongue licking at the rugged bit of his palate and the feeling of two handfuls of prime Asgardian ham. Did they have sex? He raised his head to check and no, the other side of the bed was still made, battalion of tiny cushions still guarding the other pillow zealously. "Jarv," he groaned, wincing at the sound of his own voice, "'ow did I get 'ome?"

"Good morning, Sir," Jarvis greeted in the soft voice Tony programmed him to use whenever he's hungover. "Mr. Skywalker carried you home."

Skywa—oh, Loki, yeah.

Wait.

Tony lifted a corner of the covers and found himself still dressed from last night, clothes smelling like club smoke and Loki's perfume. "Did Loki tuck me in?" he asked, barely daring to hope. He didn't know what he would do if it turned out that Loki _had_. Probably die of warm and fluffy feelings.

"Indeed, Sir," Jarvis replied.

Warmth spreading over his chest, Tony smiled into his pillow. Loki _cared_. God, that was good to know. Tony might yet trick him into an actual relationship so they could pick each other's brains and then have fantastic sex. He wonders if Loki would want to top all the time — his ass clenches in anticipation — or if he'd like to bottom — and _oh,_ he can just picture what Loki would look like, flushed and sweaty as demanding, _Harder, faster, you unevolved ape,_ breathily… Maybe he'd like to switch.

His phone rang.

Tony would have loved to ignore it and just reach down into his pants instead, but it was the super-special OMG-Tony-We-Need-Your-Help-This-Is-An-Emergency ringtone, which he really, really shouldn't not answer. Sighing, he picked up and murmured, "You're reached the life-model decoy of Tony Stark. Please leave a messa—"

“Stark!” It was Fury, barking in his ear like a spoilt bulldog. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?”

Tony blinked to alertness, pushing up on his elbow. What the heck had Fury's panties in a twist this time? “Erm, I have no idea what you’re talking about. I'm at home, sleeping off a hangover. Or I was, until you called." Yeah, no way he was gonna tell Fury that he'd interrupted Tony's me-time with his dick… He fought so hard not to laugh that he almost missed what Fury was saying.

“…pictures all over the news!” Fury shouted. “Were you under mind-control? Motherfucking ensorcelled? What could possibly have possessed you to take Loki on a date?”

Tony’s stomach fell and he stared at the phone in dismay. Had Fury put a tail on him, the fucker?

“Stark, are you listening?” Fury demanded, his voice tiny coming from the speaker.

Tony put the cellphone on loudspeaker. "Yeah, I'm listening. I bumped into him at the bar. We danced." His heart raced. "That's all."

"Uh huh," Fury grunted. "And then you helped him get out a fishbone stuck in his throat with your tongue, right?" He snorted. "Look, Tony. There are pictures all over Perez Hilton's website."

Tony groaned and dropped back down onto the pillow. "Fuck," he muttered, punching the mattress with his free hand. "I was drunk as hell," he told Nick. "But let me call Pepper and my PR department and see what I can do."

"You'd better!" Then, disconnect tone. Fury had hung up on him.

Tony grimaced and opened the contacts on his phone. He was scrolling down looking for Pepper when he spotted something new under the Ls.

 _Loki_ , was the contact name. A tap brought up a cellphone number and an email address saved as contact info.

Grinning and forgetting all about Pepper, paparazzi, PR and Fury, he texted Loki.

_Last night was fun. Wanna go for ice-cream after lunch?_


	8. who needs servants when you have lovers

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> If there is one thing Loki can't resist, it's being treated like royalty.

Loki was still in handcuffs; the magic-suppressing kind that made his skin itchy and his blood stagnant. He'd been seized during Doom's latest plot because, apparently, pointing and laughing as Victor was defeated constituted grounds for citizen's arrest. He'd have to check with his lawyer.

Well, at least the so-called-Fantastic Fools had the decency to give him a cage with no transparent walls, unlike his not-brother's pack of mangy curs. They seemed to share Asgard's fetish of depriving their prisoners of all apparent privacy. In fact, the 'cell' he was in could more aptly be described as 'room', as if Loki was a guest… Interesting. They must want something from him, he decided.

A knock sounded on the door.

' _They even knock!_ ' Loki observed, delighted. "Come in!" he crowed, feeling rather well-predisposed to whoever was about to enter.

The woman came in. Suzanne? Sus—oh. _Sue_. Right. She came in with a tray of downright great-smelling food. "Evening, Loki," she said as she walked over to him.

Loki raised his hand from his knee to wave at her. "Hello, Sue." Why not be friendly? After all, these mortals had been nothing but cordial and respectful. "That smells fantastic." He held his arms to his chest.

Sue gave him a tiny I-know-what-you're-doing smile and put the tray on his lap. They'd already done the if-you-behave-I'll-uncuff-you song and dance at lunch, so this time she simply took the cuffs off and plopped down next to him on the bed.

Loki didn't mind, not when he had food to consume. He dug in with gusto, wondering who had cooked this stew and if he could either kidnap them or hire them.

"Why do you keep doing this?" Sue asked suddenly.

Pausing with his spoon halfway to his mouth, Loki arched an eyebrow at her. "What do you mean?"

The woman shrugged. "The villain thing. The plots." She made a sweeping gesture around the room. "Doom."

"Oh, that," Loki said dismissively. "For entertainment." Put the spoon in his mouth. The stew was as good as it smelled.

Sue arched an eyebrow. "Word from Stark is you started a rebellion."

Loki shrugged. "Odin is a tyrant. Besides," he scooped up another spoonful, "he deserved it." Is this an interrogation? He's not sure. They've been so _nice_ to him — feeding him well, giving him privacy, sending the woman who was obviously a mother and the queen of the household, reminding him of Frigga. He should have seen it coming.

Sue was sitting in silence, her legs daintily crossed. Like this, one could easily forget she was a threat. "I think I get it," she said, staring at the wall with Loki. "Eternity must get boring."

Ohhh. She was trying to _understand him_. That made more sense. Loki nodded. "Dreadfully so. It's not so bad when you are surrounded by other immortals, doing the same thing over and over; you tend not to notice the passage of time." He ate some more of the delicious stew. "Like a movie replaying over and over."

Sue was silent, but her eyes were wide.

Seeing he had her attention, Loki continued. "But if you are exiled from the turning of the wheel of Fate… If you stand outside the movie, so to speak, then you start seeing things for what they truly are."

The woman nodded. "I think I see your meaning."

The conversation ended there, turning into a surprisingly comfortable silence as Loki finished his meal.

When he gave her his hands to put the cuffs back on, she decided not to. "Tony Stark will be coming to pick you up soon," she said, her eyes twinkling madly. Her tone was suggestive, teasing, as if…

Loki abruptly remembered his lapse in judgment nearly two weeks ago, when he'd allowed Stark to kiss him in plain view of anyone with a camera phone. He blushed. Was she leaving the magic restraints off in case he wanted to flee to avoid the man? He was not a coward! He scowled. "Why _him_?" he muttered.

Sue laughed.

* * *

Stark was as annoying as ever. He kept giving Loki suggestive smiles and heated glances as he escorted him out of the Baxter Building and into a car.

A red sports car. Convertible.

Loki, still uncuffed and free to do as much magic as he wanted, had the unwelcome thought that maybe he'd been tricked. This wasn't how a dangerous prisoner was transported to his new prison… This was a _date._ He stared at Stark.

The man saw him looking and blushed fetchingly. "So, I guess it would be a stretch to take you to that ice-cream parlor we talked about and pretend I'm ordering something for the Avengers, huh?"

Loki's eyebrows rose to his hairline, but he quickly wiped the surprise off his face and clipped his seatbelt on. "The car gave it away," he muttered. Warmth suffused his chest and he had no clue why. "Did you plan this?"

Stark rubbed the back of his head sheepishly. "I couldn't get a hold of you," he explained, turning the key in the ignition. "So yeah, I planned this little scheme. Sue’s a sucker for romance, so she helped me set it up."

' _He planned this trick for_ me?' Loki thought, charmed against his will. Heart skipping a beat, he licked his lips. "Never quit your day job. You'd starve as a supervillain."

Stark let out a nervous chuckle and patted Loki's knee. "No, I wouldn't. You'd take pity on me."

Loki reached down and gently removed the far-too-warm hand — seriously, had Stark been clutching a hot stone before this? — from his leg. "Keep dreaming."

* * *

Stark took Loki to an ice-cream parlor even after Loki had divined his completely transparent plan. Afterwards, because apparently Stark had balls of brass that dragged when he walked, he invited Loki home 'for coffee'.

Loki, half-unfamiliar with human euphemisms, did not realize that 'coffee' meant sex, so he accepted. (He had a weakness for the beverage, when it was well prepared.)

Imagine his surprise at finding himself with an armful of lusty mortal the second the elevator doors closed behind them. But since Stark's kissing skills were much improved when he was sober, Loki merely rested his hands on the mortal's waist and coolly allowed him to showcase his repertoire. When the man pulled away, breathing hard, Loki asked him if he was done.

Stark's brow furrowed. "I'm—I'm not." He gave Loki a once-over, and then his eyes widened and he pulled away. "Shit, sorry." He wiped his mouth and lowered his gaze to the floor. "I thought…" He shook his head, blushing in blotches. "You didn't…"

Loki licked his lips, tasting the chocolate mousse ice-cream Stark had ordered, and took pity on him. "We're at your residence," he said, as if to explain his faux pas, and added, "I still want my coffee."

Stark looked at him incredulously for half a second and laughed bitterly. "Of course. Coffee." He bit his lip, shaking his head slowly, and led Loki to his kitchen. There, he turned on a machine that wouldn't have looked out of place in a sci-fi film ( _ahem,_ not that Loki had watched any) and proceeded to create a confection worthy of any tortured Starbucks barista. He handed it Loki with a flourish. "Coffee dessert for His Highness?"

' _How charming_ ,' Loki thought against his will, taking it graciously. He sipped it and liked Stark even more than when he'd bought him Three Suicide By Chocolate Nugget sundaes in a row just to keep him there and talking. "Very nice, Peasant," he said, believing Stark deserved some praise.

Stark's face lit up like a supernova and he asked, "Would you like cookies to go with that?"

Loki decided then and there that he would let Stark take him to bed.

* * *

An hour later, Loki found himself practically purring as he stroked Tony's hair.

The eager-to-please mortal was lying with one leg between Loki's and his head pillowed on Loki's chest. He'd barely managed to get something to wipe Loki's stomach with before falling into a doze; he was currently snoring softly and burrowing as deep as he could into Loki's armpit.

Loki had enjoyed himself immensely. Tony — the man had insisted on being called thus, at least in bed, and Loki had had no objections — had been fantastic. Well, his endurance could use as little work (they'd only had two rounds) but he was excellent at obeying. He'd responded to Loki's orders with nothing but a delighted smile and eyes wide in wonder, and he'd tried his damned best to follow them to the letter.  He couldn't remember the last time he'd told a lover 'yes, just like that,' and they had not seemed to hear 'harder' or 'deeper' and ruined everything.

Fingers following the grain of Tony's hair, tracing lazy spirals into his scalp, Loki leaned up and kissed his mortal's forehead. The imprint of his lips glowed golden for a moment before being absorbed into Tony's aura, marking him for at least a month. He wasn't sure; mortal auras were easily shed or contaminated, and Stark often had contact with magical beings. It mattered not; he would renew his claim when it was needed.

For now, Tony belonged to him. 


	9. who needs someone who can't rescue themselves

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tony gets kidnapped. Loki helps in little ways.

After such a successful date, Tony was really pretty sure that he and Loki were now officially seeing each other.

Apparently, Loki never got the memo, because it'd been two weeks and there hadn't been one peep from the dude. Nothing. Not even a text message or a 'Loki wuz here' graffiti on the side of Stark Tower.

Tony stared at his phone and willed it to ring. Naturally, it didn't; he resisted the urge to shake it. All  _that_  would achieve would be calling Pepper's cell.

He decided he was going to wait one more week before setting another trap for Loki.

It wasn't like Loki had minded the first time around, right?

* * *

Tony didn't make it to the end of the week: he got kidnapped.

Well, okay, so technically he was 'taken captive during battle,' but shit is still shit, however much the stink changes. And Tony can assure you, without a shadow of a doubt, that being 'taken captive' by a new faction of upstart villains is complete and utter shit.

From what he'd heard while pretending to be unconscious, the group had been just planning to steal the plans for some new weapon from SHIELD, not steal  _Iron Man_. But one of them, the leader who was 100% nuts, had decided that a downed genius superhero with and his million-dollar prosthetic suit that was centuries ahead of anything mass produced were actually pretty valuable too.

So here Tony was, locked up in a 'cell' that once upon a time had been a working ice truck. His captors, whom he'd dubbed  _The Teletubbies_ because they were just overgrown babies who fucked shit up out of ignorance, had at least been considerate enough to provide him with a source of light and a bucket to use as toilet. Still, he didn't do well with solitary confinement.

He had no idea where the suit — or whatever was left of it — had gone. His biggest fear was that the greedy n00bs had sold it piecemeal on eBay or whatever the Deep Web equivalent was. He really, really didn't want repulsor technology falling into the wrong hands, and he seriously doubted morons were discerning enough to tell left hand from right, let alone wrong.

But trapped in a fourteen-by-six solid steel broken ice truck freezer with a bucket and a LED dynamo flashlight as his only connection to modern technology, there was little he could do that wasn't sit tight and hope his team tracked him down soon.

* * *

There was instant ramen for dinner. And for breakfast and for lunch.

Maybe. Tony wasn't sure if they were feeding him three times a day or two. He could only hope only two days had passed instead of three; he didn't like the odds of retrieving the parts of his suit if the buyers had so much of a head start.

He'd come up with a whole new theory for how the Stark boson (named after himself, of course, since he'd been the one to invent them to describe the way magic happened) interacted with matter, and he really needed to write it down. But hell if he was going to bang on the freezer door to demand pen and paper. Last time he'd tried to get their attention, Dipsy had tased him so he would stop making noise.

The light from the little flashlight flickered off, plunging him into darkness. Sighing, he closed his eyes, tricking his brain into not freaking out by pretending it was  _his_  idea not to see anything, and began pumping the dynamo. He kept going even after the light turned back on again.

He wondered if Loki would hear him if he prayed. And then he wondered if Loki would just leave him to the sharks anyway.

* * *

The door opened again far too soon to be the next meal, unless Tony had lost track of time again.

Lala came into the room, pinching her dainty nose at the smell of stale piss. "Get up, Stark," she ordered, crossing her arms over her flat chest. "Your buyer is coming to pick you up."

Tony froze in the middle of standing. "My buyer," he repeated, hoping he hadn't just been sold into slavery or something.

The girl shrugged. "Yeah, we auctioned you off on Ebay." She motioned for his hands.

More interesting in finding more about this than punching her smug face and making a run for it, he gives his wrists over. "Really? Who bid?"

Lala arched an eyebrow at him, leaving the ' _do you think I'm stupid?_ ' implied as she tied his wrists with two zip ties.

It didn't matter. Tony would escape whoever bought him — the thought made him nauseous — and look the auction up. Then he would proceed to ruin the lives of everyone who'd bid. He wouldn't even kill them, he would bankrupt and sic the IRS on them.

Lala led him out of the freezer — except it was less 'led' and more 'practically killed him by tugging him out without warning — to the warehouse where they'd parked it.

It was a different warehouse. Tony hadn't felt the truck moving; had they drugged him?

There was a conspicuously inconspicuous black car waiting for them, along with even more conspicuous beefy men wearing suits and holding automatic weapons. The car door opened, and out came  _Justin_   _Hammer, of all fucking people._

He was chewing gum with his mouth open and grinning. "Hello, Tony, fancy meeting you here." He looked Tony up and down, grin turning into a leer.

Of course. Tony rolled his eyes. That fucking sleazeball. He'd probably put Tony in a tiny room and make him invent stuff for Hammer Industries. "Hi, Hammer. Couldn't call my office like everyone else?"

Hammer laughed. "Oh, but my new golden goose warrants special treatment." He looked to his hired goons, but they didn't laugh.

 _Golden goose_.

Tony felt hot with sudden ire. Screw the IRS, he was going to make Hammer  _explode into smithereens_ , just as he'd done to the last asshole to call him that.

"Oh, look at him," Hammer said, holding his hand out next to the car door, "Isn't he adorabl? So  _angry._ " Someone held out a briefcase and Hammer grabbed it.

Tinky-Tinky, the leader, and Hammer approached each other. Suddenly, everyone in the warehouse was really, really tense. But Hammer gave the briefcase to the n00b, and Tinky-Winky opened it.

It was full of money.

Tinky-Winky thumbed through the cash, checking it was all in hundreds, and handed it over to Dipsy. Then he looked expectantly at Hammer.

The sleazeball produced another two briefcases full of cash, which were counted just as thoroughly, and a USB stick, which was received by the n00bs like it was made of gold dust.

"There you go," Hammer said. "Three million to get you started and an AI to hack any computer you want. Just plug it in and click 'Hack', then click 'Unhack' to delete all traces." He waved a hand dismissively. "Don't worry, there's a readme file."

The moron still said 'hack'. Tony felt like kicking him in the balls just on principle.

Tinky-Winky grinned and held out his hand. "Pleasure doing business with you, Mr. Hammer."

Hammer shook it.

And that's when everything went to hell.

* * *

Later, talking to Loki, Tony would piece together what happened, but this is what he saw:

First, the lights went out. Completely. Even the holes in the ceiling and the windows turned solid black.

Instinctively, Tony hit the floor, and not a second too soon.

Bullets started flying. Then, the Teletubbies began returning fire, so to speak, with their mutant superpowers.

Gritting his teeth, Tony crawled on his belly towards the car, narrowly avoiding being impaled by a lance of ice. A bullet got him in the left shin, though he wouldn't realize that until later, when he was safe.

The driver, or whoever had been sitting in the front seat, had left the car to join the fray, leaving the door stupidly open.

Tony climbed inside, all ready to break the ignition and jump-start the car, and discovered the keys were still there.  _'Someone needs to hire cleverer goons_ ,' he thought, starting the car and driving off.

The headlights made him an easy target. Some people yelled and shot at him. He ducked as low as he could while still seeing over the top of the steering wheel.

At some point, he saw Hammer running and waving his arms like an idiot, yelling, "That's my car!" and, seeing red, made a detour to run him over. The car made a very satisfying crunch as it smashed into Hammer's body, but Tony had no time to revel in it. He spotted the exit and accelerated.

The closed aluminum doors were old and corroded. The car bowled it over, tearing the metal off its hinges.

Finally free, Tony sped off. When he looked at the warehouse on the rearview mirror, he found it covered in thick, black sludge.

* * *

Tony sat in his living room, watching the news and enjoying a beer. His leg had been patched up by Bruce and he'd been fed a ridiculous amount of antibiotics, which had made him really tired, so now he was chilling out. Jarvis was working on finding out who'd bid in the auction; Tony would crush them like plastic bottles after he had a nap, when he felt a little less drowsy.

Suddenly, there was a knock on his window, and he looked up.

Loki was standing in his balcony, regal as ever, but also solemn, which was never a word Tony had associated with him before. Hanging from his hand was a bag from the ice-cream parlor they'd gone to on their first official date.

Tony stood up and regretted instantly. Standing on a shot let hurt like a bitch. "Jarvis, let him in," he said, sitting back down.

Jarvis did, and Loki walked in as if he owned the place. Outside, a black form unglued itself from the balcony and flew off.

"Hi, Loki," Tony said, waving at him. "I see you kept the dragon."

That made Loki's lips twitch. He sat down next to Tony and opened the bag, revealing an insulated container and two plastic spoons. "I see you escaped," he said, handing Tony a spoon and taking the lid off.

Tony snorted. "You got all chocolate, Honey." He smiled at Loki. "I like the ones with fruits."

Loki shrugged. "I bought it, I get to pick." He sunk the spoon into a section of dark brown and scooped some out. "I got different kinds of chocolate. This one has fruit." Without warning, he held the spoon to Tony's mouth.

Feeling giddy, Tony opened his lips and took it. There were hard lumps in the ice-cream, and he bit down on them, revealing walnuts and almonds. "Dry fruit," he observed, licking his lips. "Clever compromise." Meaning, 'you tried'. With his own spoon, he scooped some from another section, lighter brown that the bit with the walnuts, and fed it to Loki.

They fed each other ice-cream for a while, watching the news reporter tell them about Justin Hammer being in the ICU following a grueling operation. When that segment was over, she began talking of all the companies whose stock value had plummeted after 'hackers' had revealed the unlawful activities of the companies or of key administrative figures.

"Well done, Pet." Loki smiled sadistically and kissed Tony on the temple, leaving a chocolaty imprint that he then licked clean.

* * *

Later, in bed, Tony lay with his head on Loki's chest, Loki's fingers playing gently with his hair. "It was you, wasn't it?" he asked. "The thing with the lights?"

Loki's hand stopped for a second before resuming the caresses. "Mmm. 'Twas me. I heard your prayer."

Tony smiled against Loki's pectoral and his arm tightened around Loki's waist. "Don't let me get shot next time, yeah?"

A noncommittal hum was his answer.

Tony kissed the supple skin under his mouth. Then, something occurred to him. "If I hadn't managed to escape…?"

Loki's fingers gripped his hair tightly and pulled so he was looking Tony in the eyes. "I would have razed everything in my path to the ground until I found you."

Sudden heat suffused Tony's entire body, but all he said was, "Oh. Thanks."

But Loki wasn't done. "And visited such tragedy and plagues as have never been seen upon those who sought to buy something that belongs to me." Then, as it flipping off a switch, he smiled lovingly at Tony and kissed him on the forehead.

A tingling feeling began right there, at the point of the kiss, and crept outward until all of Tony's skin was tingling. Thinking about Loki's words, he swallowed hard, thinking that maybe he'd bitten off slightly more than he could chew by courting a millennium-old alien sorcerer.

And then Loki began stroking his hair again, sighing contentedly.

Tony smiled and, for once, decided he'd figure all this out later.


	10. who needs forgiveness when you can ask permission

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Loki might consider Tony 'his', but he still needs to ask

Against all odds, Tony had managed to keep Loki's interest for a full five months, two weeks, and one day. Not that he was counting. After their rather rocky start (the thing with the ice-cream and the sex, after which Loki had dropping him like a hot potato, only to reappear when Tony was nearly sold into slavery — long story) they'd started seeing each other at least once a week.

Since Loki had liked their first official outing, Tony decided that the best course for keeping him entertained was taking him places, so he did. Often.

The amusement park was a favorite of Loki, as he loved the rollercoasters and, unexpectedly, the cotton candy . He'd buy them by threes and feed a couple bites to Tony by hand here and now. One time, when some small-time villain tried something and Tony couldn't attend, Loki took out his displeasure by making the haunted house actually scary, traumatizing more than one teenage couple who'd gone inside to make out.

They went to the Opera exactly the once, and they were kicked out in the first fifteen minutes for lewd behavior. It turned out that Loki thought that molesting Tony in the box (with Tony's entirely willing participation, of course) was a million times more interesting than suffering through words mangled by high-pitched voices. Who would have guessed?

Theater, Loki loved; Tony took him there many times as well. He discovered Loki had a fatal weakness for musicals because Loki would hum the songs for days afterwards, often until Tony exploded and yelled at him to quit it.

They'd gone ice skating. They'd sat in park benches just watching dogs run and eating cake. They'd gone on a three-day retreat to a spa and had sex in the mud baths. And then in the hot tub while they washed the mud off. In one memorable occasion, Tony had taught Loki to drive and then accompanied him to get his license.

And slowly, as the months progressed, they started staying in more and more. Tony would make sure to have interesting and exotic things to keep Loki curious, or, well, to  _do_  interesting and exotic things to Loki.

Then, five months, two weeks, and one day into their arrangement, something magical happened: Loki called first. Not only that, which was novel in itself, but he invited Tony to his apartment.

Tony had never been so nervous in his life.

* * *

Tony arrived at Loki's precisely at five thirty pm, dressed in pressed jeans and bearing a bouquet of exactly seven white calla lilies, as per Loki's instructions.

Loki opened the door before he could knock. He spotted the flowers and grinned at Tony, in that order, before making a fist in his t-shit and pulling him into the apartment.

Tony went easily enough, though he was kinda annoyed at being used as a delivery boy. If Loki had wanted just the flowers, he could have told Tony in the first place instead of getting him all hopeful and making him come here. He grabbed Loki by the back of the neck and pulled him down into a kiss.

Loki obliged him, but then pulled back and took the flowers, turning away from him and walking into a door, presumably one that led to his room.

Tony looked incredulously at his back. Seriously. Making him come here  _for flowers,_  what the actual f—

"Are you coming or not, Pet?" Loki asked, watching him over his shoulder. His eyes were strangely soft. "I cannot do this without you."

Processing that, Tony blinked a couple times. Then he wiggled his eyebrows at Loki and followed him eagerly.

* * *

Tony found himself naked and tied spread-eagle on the bed, Loki looming over him, equally naked.

Which would have been promising, except for the fact that Loki was doing the looming while  _holding a knife._

Yeah… Tony was freaking out a little here, but who could blame him? It wasn't every day that you alien lover grinned maniacally at your restrained self while testing the sharpness of a blade. "Ummmm, Honeybee? Sweetiepie?" he said uncertainly. "Cupcake, what are you doing?"

Loki gave him a sweet smile that was completely at odds from the shower of sparks he caused every time he ran the sharpening stone along the edge. "Preparing the knife so it does not hurt you unduly."

' _Oh, how considerate_ ,' Tony thought, his balls shriveling. "And, and after?" Why was his voice shaking? No, no; he needed to make his voice manly and sexy and talk dirty to remind Loki why he hadn't killed Tony until then. "I mean. Are you planning to cook me? Because if you're gonna fillet me, I'd rather be dead first, if it's all the same to you."

Loki laughed, sounding even happier than he had on their last date, after Tony had subbed for him. "I'm not going to  _kill_  you, dear pet of mine," he said sweetly as he climbed onto the bed, knife gleaming wickedly in his careless hand. He cupped Tony's face and stroked under his chin lovingly, then swooped down and kissed him gently. "I'm going to make you permanently mine."

Tony blinked and bit his tongue, trying to keep his face from showing his panic. "Oh, I see," he whispered shakily. Why had he pursued Loki so relentlessly? Why hadn't he followed the old adage,  _never stick your dick in crazy_? He stared right up at the ceiling, avoiding Loki's eyes.

Loki noticed. Of course he noticed; Loki noticed  _everything_. It was like he ADD sometimes. "You are scared of me, Pet," he said, tilting his head to the side like a vulture eyeing a corpse. "I thought you trusted me."

Letting out a nervous giggle, Tony replied, "I thought I could, yeah, so I did." He closed his eyes and pulled on the magical rope tying him down. It didn't budge. "So sue me." He felt like crying. This was even worse than Obie's betrayal; he'd worked so, so hard to earn Loki's love and now… Now he regretted it.

"Shhh, shhhh, Tony, Love, you are breathing too fast," Loki murmured soothingly, stroking his hair and cheeks and neck.

There was a clatter — the knife falling to the hardwood floor — and then the ropes loosened all at once.

Tony curled up into a ball and rolled sideways off the bed. He stood with his back to the wall, staring at Loki with wide eyes.

Loki smiled at him, looking a lot less manic, and patted the bed on a spot next to his knees.

Nuh-uh. Not in a million years. Keeping his eyes of his crazy (ex?)boyfriend, Tony hunted for his clothes and got dressed.

Loki's face fell. "Are you not even going to let me explain?" he asked, subdued. He hadn't moved from the bed, but he'd helped Tony find his clothes by making them levitate to him.

"Forget it," Tony said, shaking his head. He was crouching down, tying his shoes. "You tie me up and shove a knife in my face? Instant breakup, Sweeney Todd."

Loki's brow knit and he stared at the knife that had somehow reappeared in his hands. "I tied you up last time, and you didn't complain," he said, looking like a broken doll. "I even slapped you. And you still loved me afterwards." The 'why don't you love me now?' was implied.

Tony scoffed. "I  _asked_ you to. And I knew you'd stop if I said to." He smiled wryly. "Correction, I  _thought_  you'd stop. Now I'm not so sure."

The knife disappeared into golden smoke, and Loki crawled on the bed towards him. "Did I not stop just now? You did not even have to say the password—"

"Safeword," Tony corrected automatically. "And I don't care. I'm leaving." He shrugged on his leather jacket, gave Loki one last hard stare, and got the hell out of there, not even looking back once.

* * *

The following days passed in a blur. Tony went through a short period of depression as he got over the fact that he had — once again — trusted someone he shouldn't have.

And it was weird that he'd fallen into trusting Loki, but he'd given the dude just so many opportunities to betray him that Loki not taking them  _had_  to mean something, right? He should have dropped Loki the second he discovered how actually crazy he was, but heck, he'd been flattered pink that Loki would consider razing entire cities to the ground for him. Hell of an ego-stroke, okay?

So he drank a lot and ate only ice cream (but never anything with chocolate) for a few days and then began cleaning out the stuff Loki had left lying around in his penthouse.

Loki made their breakup public by going on a nation-wide prank spree. Knowing he was only doing it to lure Tony out and try to feed him silver-tongued bullshit, Tony stayed in and made the other Avengers go.

One day about a week into his post-breakup stupor, Thor asked to talk with him. Of course, Thor being Thor, the pressing question was not how Tony was handling not having a boyfriend anymore (the answer was "not well", for anyone who cared to know), but what had caused the chasm.

And Tony told him  _everything_ , watching Thor grow paler and paler.

When Tony finished his tale ("So I got the hell out of dodge, and that's about it."), Thor opened his mouth and the most unexpected thing came out:

"I am not familiar with callas. What color is this flower?"

Like that mattered somehow? Tony regarded him with all the WTF-ness he deserved . "Erm… White. Why?"

Thor grabbed him by the shoulders and told him.

Apparently, there was this thing sorcerers did on Asgard when they decided they wanted to own a person (generally a lover, but they also marked slaves this way). It consisted in having the willing submission of this person, for starters, which was shown by the claimee allowing the claimer to… Something. Tie them up, blindfold them, whip them, anything they placed the one at the mercy of the other. Then the sorcerer would carve the runes of their name into the skin of the claimee, basically marking them on a soul-deep level. Meaning, the marks would heal and fade from the skin ( _now_  the obsessive-compulsive sharpening of the blade made more sense); the aura, essence, soul, or whatever you wanted to call it, would remain forever marked.

The flowers? They needed to be white because they were used to soak up the spilled blood, and then the used petals were boiled to make a tea, and the claimer would drink it, officially bringing the other into their body, recognizing them as part of themselves.

' _A.K.A._ ,' thought Tony, stomach dropping, ' _marriage._ '

Which freaked Tony out for an entirely different reason.

* * *

After a sleepless night and a whole lot of scotch, Tony decided that he and Loki needed to talk. And apologize to each other. Loki for abusing Tony's trust and trying to a) get them married and b) carve his name into Tony's skin,  _without asking first_   _,_ and Tony for not trusting him and not giving him a chance to explain.

Besides, Tony still hadn't got to ride on the stupidly cool dragon.

He decided to wait until Loki's next 'attack' (read: grand-scale prank) and get him alone when he inevitably got captured. He stocked up on apology ice-cream, even, and got Loki's usual cell all nice and pimped out, just to convey that he was really, really sorry and also Loki had his own place at Stark Tower so he'd feel welcome.

Everything went like clockwork — even Loki's attack during the airing of the Kardashians tv show (he hated them and was determined to lower their ratings even if he had to do it by hand ) — except for one little detail that on any other day would have been insignificant.

The Avengers were not the first team of heroes on the scene.

By the time Tony got there, a group of three superheroes had trapped Loki in a circle and were giving each other's high fives.

Tony recognized them. He didn't know their names, but they'd crossed paths before. They represented the ugly side of superheroism: the only reason they were considered "good guys" was that they fought the bad guys, but they were just as bad.

Which didn't exactly bode well for Loki.

Before he could say anything, Steve took a step forward and held his hand out. "Thank you for subduing the criminal so quickly. We'll take it from here." Only those who knew him well could hear the distaste in his voice.

Their leader, a woman with a blood-red Mohawk and a silver pentagram hanging over her torn black tank top, stood in front of Loki and crossed her arms. "Sorry, Blondie, no can do."

Steve sputtered at being called 'Blondie'. Tony snorted, liking the chick's spunk.

The woman carried on. "See, you every time you dipshits capture this dude, he's out on the streets causing mayhem two days later."

Her friends, dressed up equally as punk, nodded along.

One of them, a boy with light blue hair and… was that a safety pin piercing his lip? Yep, definitely a safety pin. Anyway, he pointed straight at Tony and yelled, "And it's all because of you,  _Moron_  Man."

Tony's eyebrows went up to his hairline, though they couldn't see it because of the faceplate. "Wow, nice pun," he said sarcastically and popped up the faceplate. "Really? All because of me? How so?"

The kid gave him a hateful glare. "You're  _consorting_  with him. You're on  _his_  side."

Next to Tony, Natasha let out a snort. " _Consorting,"_  she repeated under her breath, making Hawkeye chortle.

Tony rolled his eyes and walked to the Three Stooges. "You clowns got it the other way round." He pointed at Loki, still staring the leader down. "That fuckup? He belongs to me. So hand him over."

In the circle, Loki stared at him, impassive.

The Stupid Trinity looked uneasily at each other. The third member, whose gender Tony couldn't tell, whispered, "Dude, that's what he's been telling us since we got here." Even hir voice was indistinct.

Little Miss General looked uneasy. "But everyone knows they broke up. He's got to be bluffing."

Tony held up a hand, commanding silence. "Okay, first of all, you." He pointed at the indeterminate one. "What's your pronouns? You have the visual cues of both genders and it's confusing the hell out of me."

The kid blushed. "Male, please." He coughed into his hand, looking very pleased with himself. "At least for today."

Tony wondered how many people bothered to ask. "Thanks. Anyway. Loki and I didn't break up, okay?"

Loki's stare intensified.

Cheeks pinkening, Tony continued, meeting his eyes. "We had a fight over a misunderstanding." This was not the way he'd wanted to start their talk, but whatever. "But that doesn't mean I don't still love him."

Loki looked away first.

Taking a deep breath, Tony turned to the three furious superheroes. "Besides, he's an endangered species. Last jotun on Earth. You can't have him in captivity."

"What?!" they yelled.

Tony carried on like an avalanche. "Also, he's not a citizen of Earth, so human laws don't technically apply to him."

The Three Stooges' mouths were flapping indignantly.

And then Tony made the coup de grace: "Besides, if you give him to me right now and promise never to go after him again, I'll fund your little operation." He grinned. "You'll get health insurance and retirement privileges."

That sure made them think. They retired a few steps to the side to confer privately.

Meanwhile, Tony crouched next to the chalk circle and smiled at Loki. "Sorry for freaking out."

Loki's eyes burned like miniature stars. "Sorry for freaking you out," he said, sounding incredibly solemn. "I should have told you—"

"Fuck you!" Tony shouted. "Told me? You should have  _asked_  me! You stupid, arrogant—argh!" He threw his hands up, too angry to speak.

"Uh, Mr. Stark," someone said.

Tony looked to the side and saw three sheepish punk/emo superheros. "We have a deal?"

They nodded. Mr. Androgynous, who was apparently the witch, broke the circle surrounding Loki — there was a loud  _pop!_  like a bottle being uncorked — and stood back.

Loki stood up like a king, head held high, shoulders squared. Looking at him, he said, "Your new boss has some excellent books on magic that might interest you. Your name?"

The kid swallowed hard. "As—as if," he stammered. Which was probably wise of him — even Tony knew names had power.

Mohawk Girl stomped on his foot with her steel-toes combat boots. "You can call him Elliot."

"Well met, Elliot," Loki told him, inclining his head. Then he looked right at Tony and  _grinned_.

That was the warning Tony got before Loki grabbed him by the shoulder and spirited him away.

* * *

Tony scratched at the bandages around his chest. His entire back ached like hell. "So much for  _if the knife it really sharp, it won't hurt_ , huh?"

Loki sat beside him, sipping reddish tea from his favorite mug. "They were all clean cuts, and shallow. The discomfort should only last until the swelling goes down."

Tony hummed noncommittally. His lower back ached from holding himself straight and away from the backrest. Loki was  _so_  giving him a massage when this was over. "Sooo… When do I get to carve  _property of Tony Stark_  into  _your_  skin?"

Loki snorted and gave Tony a look that said,  _pull the other, it's got bells._ "I don't think you understood the meaning of this ritual."

Tony narrowed his eyes at him and turned in his hands the knife that not long ago had been carving runes into his back. He smirked.

Loki's eyes widened.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Annnnnnnd that's all, folks!


End file.
